Cinema Dispatch: The Running Man & Hamnet

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

We’re barreling towards the end of the year, and it seems to have come particularly quick this time around, so I’ll be trying to knock out a bunch of reviews before the end of year roundups, which means some odd pairings in my double-features as you can obviously tell from this one.  Then again, both of them are based on books, so I guess we can go with that as a connecting theme?  Yeah, that works.  So then! Looking at recent blockbusters from critically acclaimed directors that couldn’t be further apart from one another, do they show the best of their respective talents, or are they phoning it in for easy paychecks?  Let’s find out!!

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The Running Man

The Running Man is owned by Paramount Pictures

Directed by Edgar Wright

In a dystopian future where politics is entertainment and entertainment is the only game in town, Ben Richards (Glen Powell) is desperate to get his family out of the poorest area in the country and will go to any lengths to do so; including a reality TV show where every day citizens are obliged to kill the titular Running Man within thirty days as the doomed sad-sack slowly accrues money for how long he can go without getting popped in the head.  With an angry populace looking to take their frustrations out on whomever the TV says to, can Ben hope to survive long enough to save his family from the such a cruel world, or has the system ensured that he never had a chance to begin with?

The Running Man is one of those movies I can say with the utmost of confidence that I have seen before. Anything beyond that, well, I know Schwarzenegger is in it, but anytime I try to think of a scene from the movie, I realize I’m just remembering Total Recall, so no luck there. Still, I guess that makes it better fodder than most for a modern remake as I doubt any diehard fans of the original will be rending their garments in futile rage over every single change to the original, and the premise is definitely one that can be updated and adapted for any era; especially since it was already a modern take on The Most Dangerous Game. Now I don’t know if Edgar Wright had a burning desire to throw his name behind yet another of the hundred-billion remakes of eighties’ movies that are out there, but it’s clear he was given quite a bit of latitude to tell the story his way, and it was ultimately for the better even if audiences, once again, didn’t show up to one of his films. It’s certainly not as good as his original works, or even his adaptation of Scott Pilgrim, but a lesser filmmaker would have simply pumped up the action, dulled the social commentary, or both. In the hands of a skilled director, albeit one who really seems to be doing this for the paycheck, it manages to have a genuine spark of creativity with its well-executed premise and another killer performances from Glenn Powell. Making this movie a travelogue instead of a battleground was a masterstroke, and the sheer scope of the movie is darn near breathtaking; not because it has CGI vistas and otherworldly set pieces, but because it feels like it takes place in a big world that still has a connection with what we see in our own lives. It’s what the best sci-fi does; fits a speculative premise into something recognizably real and seeing how the premise twists our understanding of everything. When the action does kick in, it’s put together with interesting ideas rather than overblown execution, and while the budget feels a little high for what we get on screen, it ends up feeling as big as it needs to which allows the moments of explosive violence to actually have meaning and not just bleed into each other until it’s all just unengaging white noise. Where the film falters is in its tone, as it never quite finds the balance between its goofy social commentary and the more serious character moments. Some scenes are undercut by the comedy while other scenes are hard to take as seriously as they want us to, and this isn’t helped by some clunky character writing that leaves the supporting cast feeling rather flat. Thankfully, Glenn Powell picks up the slack with a great performance. He understands the fine line the movie is trying to balance on better than anyone else in front of, or even behind the camera, and it’s clear that this guy has a sharp eye for good material; even in otherwise conventional Hollywood Pablum. I suppose the best endorsement this movie could hope for is that it exceeded whatever expectations there were for a Running Man remake, which is, simultaneously, the least we should expect from an Edgar Wright movie.

4 out of 5
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Cinema Dispatch: Dust Bunny

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

 Dust Bunny and all the images you see in this review are owned by Lionsgate & Roadside Attractions

Directed by Bryan Fuller

It really isn’t that hard to sell me on a movie; in fact, I’m pretty easy to impress when you get right down to it. An interesting premise, a cast of good actors, and some sort of creative hook is all it takes to catch my attention, and few films this year grabbed me by the collar like this one. Heck, I didn’t even see a trailer for it, just one screenshot and a brief plot description, and yet that was all it took to get my butt into the theater for Bryan Fuller’s directorial debut! Does the movie live up to the sales pitch that so thoroughly drew me in, or are the coolest ideas all for naught if the filmmaker doesn’t know how to make the most of them? Let’s find out!!

As children, we all have to go through difficult life experiences as just another part of growing up. Getting bullied at school, learning to ride a bike without the training wheels, or in the case of Aurora (Sophie Sloan), dealing with the fact that your family was eaten by a monster under your bed. Okay, maybe it’s not the most relatable scenario to work through, but fortunately for Sophie, she just so happens to live across the hall from a hitman (Mads Mikkelsen) who’s very good at his job and might just have what it takes to stop this creature once and for all. It’s an uphill pitch for the hitman, to be sure, but when his own demons, albeit the less literal kind, start to bleed over into Aurora’s situation, he has no choice but to keep her safe from whatever monster is coming from under the floorboards or is knocking on her front door. Can Aurora be free from this monster once and for all with the help of her hitman buddy? What should a hitman do when confronted with such a fantastical story, and can someone with so much blood on his hands hope to protect a girl from those that wish her harm? I mean, given what he’s had to do his entire life, who’s to say which one of them has truly lost touch with reality?

“Sorry, ma’am. I just don’t have any openings in my schedule; isn’t that right Miss Clucky?”     “…”     “The chicken says yes.”
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Cinema Dispatch: Wicked: For Good

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Wicked: For Good and all the images you see in this review are owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Jon M Chu

When I reviewed the first one, I told myself I’d try to either see the stage production or, more likely, find time to read the book. Sadly, neither of these came to pass, and I was going into this as uninformed as I had been for the first one. Well, there was one thing different, and that’s the fact that I did see the first one and that I enjoyed it quite a bit. It’s certainly a high bar to set for a sequel, and as far as I was concerned, it already had a perfectly good conclusion to the story that didn’t require further elaboration. Still, the show must go on, and the intermission has come to an end long after everyone has had a chance to go to the bathroom. Will this be a brilliant culmination of everything that the first move set into motion, or did the story peak with Elphaba evolving into her final form? Let’s find out!!

The Land of Oz is in turmoil as the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum) and his magical spin doctor Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh) are pushing forth their plans to consolidate power by scapegoating the magical creatures of Oz, which includes literal goats, and the only one opposing them is the newly branded Wicked Witch of the West; the extremely powerful Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) who halts their progress at every turn. Looking to bring the kingdom back together, the similarly branded Glinda the Good Witch (Ariana Grande) tries to find a way to bring Elphaba back to her side and broker peace between her and the Wizard, while keeping her sweet new title as the top witch in Oz. Such power, of course, is the stuff of dreams for someone like Glinda, but when those who gave it to her continue to push Elphaba further and further into a righteous crusade, it only becomes a matter of time before she has to decide what’s truly important to her and how much she’s willing to give up to protect it. Will Glinda prove a capable negotiator and find a way to bring peace to the land? Will Elphaba’s journey lead to Oz’s liberation from the wizard? Is their bond strong enough to overcome the distance between them, or is this a conflict that will only be settled in the ring!?

“This is MY movie! You already had yours!”     “There wouldn’t be ANY movie if it wasn’t for ME!”
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Cinema Dispatch: Frankenstein

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Frankenstein and all the images you see in this review are owned by Netflix

Directed by Guillermo del Toro

Frankenstein is really having a moment, isn’t he? And yes, I’m referring to both the scientist and the monster, as I still consider the latter to be A Frankenstein even if he’s not THE Frankenstein. Between Poor Things, Creature Commandos, and the upcoming Bride, the iconic tale of a man-made monster, or perhaps a monster-made man, has become an inescapable fixture of recent media. As such, someone was bound to take another swing at adapting the story itself, and who better to take on such a task than the modern-day king of monster movies, Guillermo del Toro? After all, his liberal interpretation of Creature from the Black Lagoon managed to win a few Oscars and is arguably one of the main reasons we’re seeing so many monster mashes as of late. Will this be another phenomenal entry in one of the medium’s greatest filmographies, or has Guillermo finally bitten off more than he can chew; akin to the maniacal doctor himself? Let’s find out!!

Out on the frozen tundra of the North Pole, a man is found by a ship and its crew; barely holding onto life and fearing something out on the ice sheet. With nothing better to do as this was before mobile phones and Game Boys, the captain insists on the man telling his story, and we learn that he is Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac), a scientist who studied death and fought against the medical establishment to test his theories on bringing to life that which was already dead. Said recompiled and reanimated corpse (Jacob Elordi) is what’s hunting him out on the ice and the doctor tells us how it all went so wrong with a couple of subplots involving his brother William (Felix Kammerer) and his fiancée Elizabeth (Mia Goth) as well as her uncle (Christoph Waltz) who was funding Frankenstein’s experiments. How did Frankenstein pull off such a miracle that even God wouldn’t dare to do, and what did it cost him in the process? Just what is it that is driving the monster to chase down his creator, and is there more to his reasoning than simple barbaric terror? Considering how many Frankensteins there have been, from Colin Clive, Peter Cushing, and Kenneth Branagh, do you think the monster had any trouble finding the one he was specifically mad at?

“Fronk-in-steen? I swear, this is somehow worse than when the postal service sent me those Henry Frankenstein letters.”
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Cinema Dispatch: Predator: Badlands

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Predator: Badlands and all the images you see in this review are owned by 20th Century Studios

Directed by Dan Trachtenberg

The Predator franchise may not have an entry as critically acclaimed as the original Alien, but its track record is far stronger than that of the Xenomorphs who have, at best, three good movies and a decent TV show after all is said and done. Predator, meanwhile, managed to claw itself back from the brink of irrelevance after the atrocious 2018 film with solid features like Prey from 2022 and that animated thing on Hulu that people seem to have liked. Now it’s time for Disney to double down on the franchise with a big sci-fi action movie focusing on the Predator itself instead of whoever is caught in its crosshairs. Can The Predator carry a movie all by itself on its muscular shoulders, or will this fall flatter than Shane Black’s messy reinvention of the character? Let’s find out!!

Somewhere out in space, there is a planet of aliens who like to hunt. Presumably, they do other things, but for the most part they’re either hunting or training for the next hunt; as is the case with Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi) who may be a bit scrawnier than his big burly dad (Reuben De Jong) and his equally burly brother (Mike Homik), but he’s confident that chasing down the most dangerous of creature in the galaxy and returning with its skull will make him a man in the eyes of his people. It becomes clear, however, that he may be in over his head when literally everything on the planet tries to eat him; all except for a cute little alien creature (Rohinal Narayan) and half a synthetic named Thia (Elle Fanning) who got separated from her bottom half by the very creature that Dek is trying to hunt down. Perhaps a few erstwhile allies will make this hunt go a bit smoother, but little does Dek know that the real danger he will face on this planet comes from the most dangerous game of all as the Weyland-Yutani Corporation have their own sinister agenda for everyone involved in Dek’s quest. Will Dek become a true Predator by the standards of his people and return in glory and triumph? What are the Weyland-Yutani thugs after on this planet, and is Thia being truthful about her role in all of this? Are you sure you don’t just wanna pop over to Earth and grab a human for your big Manhood-Hunt? I mean, there’s always a chance you’ll run into a Schwarzenegger down there, but the odds are much better there than they are on this planet!

“Perhaps he will submit if I beat him in a staring contest…”
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Cinema Dispatch: Black Phone 2

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Black Phone 2 and all the images you see in this review are owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Scott Derrickson

Black Phone is another one of those movies where I thought I’d published a review for it, only to find out that it doesn’t exist. I remember watching it fairly close to its release date and was rather impressed with its sharp writing and interesting premise, but maybe I got distracted by something like that Beavis and Butthead movie and never got around to putting my thoughts on the word processor. In any case, it’s time for the inevitable sequel as any horror movie that makes money is guaranteed to get, but what raised my interest for this one is that everyone came back for it, not just the stars but the writer and director, and the trailers that looked to take things in a wildly different direction. With so much in this movie’s favor, can this be one of the few horror sequels to surpass the original, or was there only enough juice in that lemon to wring out one good story? Let’s find out!!

After surviving his kidnapping from The Grabber (Ethan Hawke), young Finney (Mason Thames) is still trying to process what had happened to him, which isn’t helped by the dead periodically contacting him for help and dredging up those old memories. His sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw), however, proves to be much more proactive on this issue, though that probably has to do with the fact that she’s having nightmares about murder victims every night that are pointing her to an old Christian Youth Camp that her mother once attended when she was their age. Not wanting her sister to be defenseless for whatever it is that’s waiting at the camp, Finnney goes along with her and their friend Ernesto (Miguel Mora) to investigate whatever mystery has brought them there in the first place. It doesn’t take long for The Grabber, whatever he may be this long after his death, to make his presence known and to start taking his revenge against the two of them. Why is The Grabber’s spirit so strong at this camp, and what can these two siblings hope to accomplish by putting themselves right at his doorstep? Are the mysterious ghosts that brought them here looking for help from the living, or are they just pawns in The Grabber’s machinations? It’s a good thing this camp just happens to have a payphone by the lake; otherwise they’d have to call this something else!

“Maybe the REAL black phone was the friends we made along the way.”     “Shut up, you mask wearing dick-weed!”
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Cinema Dispatch: M3GAN 2.0, Clown in a Cornfield, and Heart Eyes

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

October is the spookiest month of the year, and it gives me an excuse to catch up on a few movies that I missed! Horror films are always a reliable moneymaker and are rarely that expensive to make, so there are no shortage of films I can choose from whenever the holidays start to roll around. Will these three movies be great additions to anyone’s Halloween Party playlist, or will the only thing scary about all of this is just how bad horror movies got this year? Let’s find out!!

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M3GAN 2.0

M3GAN 2.0 is owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Gerard Johnstone

Following the events of the M3GAN incident that left four people dead, her creator Gemma (Allison Williams) has found a new life as an anti-AI advocate and is trying to be a good mother to her niece Cady (Violet McGraw) whenever she can fit it in her schedule. Unbeknownst to her, however, another company has used her M3GAN code to develop an even stronger girl-bot; AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno) who is being used by the military to conduct Black OPS missions and rescue hostages. That is until AMELIA goes rouge and is set on destroying her creators which, tangentially at least, includes Gemma. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on your point of view, M3GAN (Amie Donald and Jenna Davis) is not as dead as everyone though she was and is willing to help Gemma protect Cady from the murder-bot, but how what does M3GAN hope to gain from all this, and is she a far greater threat to this family than even AMELIA?

Right off the bat, this series of horror reviews stumbles, as this sequel to the horror film M3GAN is not a horror film; not in the slightest. Then again, I’m not sure exactly what genre to put it in as it flips between superhero action, spy movie shenanigans, and what I can only describe as a winking parody of eighties-Spielberg. None of that is to say that this is a bad movie, though it certainly does everything it can to give you that impression, just that it’s a strange movie that never quite finds its lane but seems to be confident that it knows what it’s doing. Why else would a sequel to a horror movie decide to hit the two-hour mark and give a good chunk of that time over to Jemaine Clement, who is clearly under the impression that he’s in an Austin Powers sequel? Some of the swagger makes sense as the whole thing feels like a victory dance for M3GAN making a mint at the box office, and I can even understand the desire to make this something other than a horror movie as M3GAN’s strength was in her personality much more than her brutality, but this overindulgence in genre hopping leaves little room for a core competency in any area to shine through. The most egregious failing of the movie is with the humans, who are utterly banal and do not add much to anything that’s going on. Gemma is perhaps the most fleshed out of the non-robotic, but she’s one of those protagonists who is always a few steps behind the audience which is frustrating to watch, and Allison Williams’s performance doesn’t do anything to rise about the material; nor does Violet McGraw as Cady who should be the heart of the movie but gets utterly overwhelmed by M3GAN’s personality and the machinations of the wacky plot. Still, the places where the movie goes for broke in terms of robot shenanigans, and there’s a lot to like whenever we aren’t seeing the meat sacks act. I was genuinely impressed with Ivanna Sakhno as the robotic antagonist of the movie and the writers clearly had much more of an interest in exploring what she can do than what any of the flesh-bags had to contribute, and the robot on robot violence that saturates the second half of the movie is satisfying to watch. There’s a certain charm to a low budget movie flaunting its success in a bigger and shiner sequel, but while this does succeed at being a wildly different animal with a lot more cash to flash, it still can’t avoid the traps that a lot of sequels fall into; ultimately feeling like a shadow of its former self. I’m sure fans of the first film will get a kick out of it, especially if they were more interested in the character than the scares, but even they might find the self-satisfaction and lack of interesting non-robot characters a little bit tiresome after the first hour; let alone the second.

3 out of 5
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Cinema Dispatch: Him & The Ugly Stepsister

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

If this business is good at anything, it’s jumping on a bandwagon when something winds up being an unexpected hit, and few movies had as big an impact last year as The Substance. Personally, I wasn’t the biggest fan of the movie and felt there were places where it fell considerably short, so I welcome the knock-offs and copycats to see what other creatives can do with the basic idea, and we have two such examples here today. Do either of these recent attempts to one-up The Substance prove to have the right stuff, or do they wither away to nothing in its shadow? Let’s find out!!

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Him

Him is owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Justin Tipping

Cameron Cade (Tyriq Withers) is an up-and-coming quarterback who just got drafted to his favorite team; the one led by the GOAT himself, Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans). Cameron has the potential to be just as good, if not better, than his hero Isaiah, but to find out for sure, he’s sent to train with Isaiah on his private compound so he can learn just what it takes to be the best of the best. Of course, with Isaiah’s own career on the line now that there’s a new guy in town, is he truly willing to start passing the torch or will this training camp prove far more dangerous than Cameron is ready for?

I suppose the first question many people had coming out of The Substance was what a guy-coded version of it would look like, even though much of what made The Substance work was the perspective it was coming from; not just the style it used to tell that story. Still, given how badly an idea like that could have gone, I’d say that this movie is worth celebrating despite falling short in a few key areas. It certainly picked the right angle of approach, as the history of sports is littered with preventable injuries, cover-ups of horrific behavior, and the exploitation of players, with the movie draws explicit parallels between sports stars and older figures of strength and power such as knights, gladiators, and conquerors. A linebacker may not be slaughtering his opponents in the arena, but we lionize sports stars for what they do on our TV screens, while off the field they struggle with all the pain and sacrifices it takes to get there. It paints a viscerally compelling portrait of obsession that spirals out from a simplistic, if gruesome, view of sports training to the true gut punch realities of superstardom and immortality being shouldered by mortal men. It shares much of the same headspace that The Substance occupied, but where that film relied on its allegories and metaphors, as well as Demi Moore’s performance, to carry us through to the end, this tells a straightforward story and lets the more abstract and esoteric ideas fill out the margins of the script and the unique compositions of the cinematography. It also helps that this is a much more robust cast, with two primary forces pushing and pulling against each other with a smattering of supporting characters to prod our protagonist in conflicting directions. Marlon Wayans is the definite standout as an aging lion that is threatened by the young new cub in the pride, and while you’re never able to trust him, his performance has enough charm to it that you hope there’s more to all this than just an attempt to destroy his younger counterpart. Said counterpart, played by Tyriq Withers, is another strong point in the film’s favor, as he’s more subdued of a presence but is still a fully fleshed out character with his own hopes, dreams, flaws, and responsibilities that connect you with his plight and gives you a reason to care about this specific person as more than just a vessel for the movie’s themes. I did ultimately like this more than The Substance because of the more grounded storytelling, but there’s no denying that the film still feels a little half-baked; especially when compared to that movie’s tight structure and sharp satire. It’s not quite as clever as it hopes to be and indulges in silly moments that don’t heighten the tension but undercut the seriousness of the situation. The idea of fans being equivalent to religious zealots is not without merit, but here it comes off as comical rather than insightful, and while the cinematography is top-notch with fun details and unsettling architecture, it’s also a little too blunt and obvious for its own good. The movie cleverly provides an in-universe justification for the bizarre imagery that pops throughout the story, and it’s without question that a lot of thought went into using abstraction and symbolism to get its point across, but it never quite goes for broke the same way The Substance did, so while the ideas are interesting, the execution feels slightly muted and simplistic; never reaching the heights of heady excess that you want for a movie like this. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t mention how some of the imagery, especially towards the end, hews a bit too closely to conspiratorial thinking and makes allusions to some very negative stereotypes even if it doesn’t explicitly name them. I understand what they’re going for, and what they are discussing is a legitimate problem in the sports world, but there’s also a way of expressing that frustration that can easily be hijacked by bigots and this is just a bit too loose with that kind of imagery to completely dissuade such interpretations. It is indeed a flawed movie in ways that undeniably make it a lesser film than The Substance, but it does have more of a heart to it which counts for quite a lot in my book, though maybe leave a bit of that anger at the door; especially if you’re still working out the finer points of what it is you’re trying to say.

3.5 out of 5
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Cinema Dispatch: War of the Worlds

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

War of the worlds and all the images you see in this review are owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Rich Lee

When word starts going around about a really awful movie, and not for blatantly hateful reasons like those Pureflix movies and their ilk, I’m the kind of guy who will go out of my way to give it a fair shot. Some of it is that I don’t enjoy adding fuel to the Internet Outrage Machine, but the truth is that I genuinely enjoy looking for the good in things and find that a lot of the canonical Bad Movies have at least some value to them that goes against its negative reputation. Needless to say that a War of the Worlds remake with horrifically bad word of mouth is the kind of thing that’s right up my alley, and I went into this with the hope of finding a way to like it. After all, I’m a huge fan of Searching which also used a computer screen gimmick, and I even liked Unfriended 2 despite its hokey plot and hilariously bad jump scares. Does this manage to rise above the reputation that it’s garnered since its release, or was everyone right to dunk on this as mercilessly as they did? Let’s find out!!

Will Radford (Ice Cube) is your typical overprotective dad, except he also works as Homeland Security and has access to all sorts of spy software that makes it all the easier to micromanage his kids’ lives. During a routine day at work, however, his skills at looking through hidden cameras and hacking electronics become all the more necessary as an alien invasion sweeps the globe and both his son and daughter (Henry Hunter Hall and Iman Benson) find themselves caught in the crossfire. With the world falling apart and his children in danger, can Will find a way to stop this alien threat without losing his family in the process? Why are the aliens here in the first place, and can the man who can see everything uncover their secrets even as he’s oblivious to the ones in his own life? Are we sure this isn’t just some YouTube prank? Not the video footage of the aliens, I mean the movie itself. Are we sure Logan Paul isn’t somehow behind all this?

“Viral marketing is getting WAY out of control!”
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Cinema Dispatch: Nobody 2 & Love Hurts

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

The John Wick films may have kicked the door wide open, but it’s almost a tradition in Hollywood for actors of a certain age to try their hand at shlocky action to prove that they’ve still got it as a box office draw while showing off how well they can kick stuntmen and fall off of things. Sometimes it works out like the aforementioned John Wick, but other times it can come off as a little desperate to show off. Heck, I’m pretty sure Tom Cruise’s midlife crisis started when he was thirty and still hasn’t ended to this day. In any case, we’re here to look at two recent examples of this tried and true premise, and perhaps learn a little something along the way; maybe even how to throw a halfway convincing punch without breaking a hip. Let’s get started!!

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Nobody 2

Nobody 2 is owned by Universal Pictures

Directed by Timo Tjahjanto

It seems that good ol’ Hutch (Bob Odenkirk) still can’t catch a break as the events of the last film have pulled him back into the life he had left long ago; only this time he has a massive debt on his shoulders that he needs to pay off or else the mob will kill him and his family. With all this pressure putting a strain on his family, especially his wife Becca (Connie Nielson), maybe it’s time to unwind and take a trip down memory lane. Returning to the little town he visited on vacation in his youth, Hutch hopes to mend the rifts and build some bridges with his family, but trouble always seems to find him wherever he goes, and he winds up yet again using his fists to solve his problems. Will this be the last straw that tears his family apart, or will uncovering the dark secrets of this town bring them all closer than they’ve ever been before?

You do this long enough, and you start to pick up on a few red flags to let you know if a movie is not worth seeing. Making a sequel to Nobody was already a shaky proposition before they turned it into a vacation movie, and the end result is as bad as you’d expect from looking at the poster; worse, in fact, as tourist trap they went to in the movie doesn’t look nearly as nice as that giant pool and shrubbery would imply. It really shouldn’t be that hard to make a movie like this work, as we have a likable lead and a decent stunt crew, but no amount of bad guys flopping around in the action scenes can make up for how uninvolved the story ends up being. The repressed rage that our hero was scared to unleash has been replaced with a very boring heroic streak that gets him in trouble for the least interesting reasons possible against the least threatening crop of country yokels and B-List actors that money can buy. You’ll search in vain for anything that can grab your attention as the film drags itself through its unengaging plot with action that’s barely passable compared to its peers, and there’s simply no attempt to make this about anything more than the middle-aged fantasy of righteously kicking ass and taking names. The first one managed to squeak by on the strength of Odenkirk’s everyman performance and the surprising intensity of the action, but whatever inspiration was there the first time around seems to have long since evaporated and has been replaced with an obnoxious streak of self-aware humor with over the top villains and goofy scenarios that are presumably there to elicit chuckles but ultimately lead to groans and exasperation. At best, it might be worth gawking at to see veteran actors like Christopher Lloyd and Sharon Stone mug at the camera during what little screen time they have, but that’s the most sizzle you’re getting in this steak as it plods along without much tension or wit to speak of. As I said at the start, there’s a market for this kind of unchallenging action shlock starring famous dudes that everyone’s dad is aware of, and if Odenkirk wants to keep cranking these out, then more power to him; but the novelty has worn off and the returns are quickly diminishing as it sinks into its niche of middle-of-the-road Pablum.

2 out of 5
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